The Fourth Finger

Although Lin Mu despised Mahito, someone who took pleasure in toying with other people's lives, and wanted nothing more than to crush him on the spot, that kind of end was far too merciful for him. Until he came up with the most agonizing way to make Mahito die, Lin Mu intended to use him to speed up the progress of his inheritance.

Besides, sparing Mahito's life would also reduce the impact on the events to come.

Back at the safe house, Nanami contemplated their next move.

Lin Mu, meanwhile, sat off to the side, sensing the subtle changes in the progress of the inheritance within his body.

After killing the cursed spirits around Mahito, Lin Mu's inheritance progress had increased by exactly 2%, bringing it to 23%.

He was close to a new milestone, but Lin Mu knew that this 2% would require at least a hundred ordinary cursed spirits to fill.

"Where can I farm cursed spirits?"

Lin Mu began recalling the places in the original story where cursed spirits gathered in large numbers. Then, a flash of thought streaked through his mind.

"I nearly forgot about this!"

If there was anywhere with a lot of cursed spirits, it would definitely be Junpei Yoshino's home in the near future.

The home of the boy Itadori was assigned to approach.

Lin Mu knew that Yoshino was aware of Mahito's existence, and at this point even regarded him as a mentor in life, holding him in great respect.

Little did he know that Mahito had always seen him as nothing more than a pawn. Later, in order to get close to Itadori and make contact with Sukuna inside him, Mahito deliberately placed one of Sukuna's Fingers in the Yoshino home.

By killing Yoshino's mother and provoking the negative emotions in Yoshino's heart, he would then make Yoshino vent his hatred on those who had bullied him at school.

This would also accomplish the goal of Mahito and Kenjaku: draw out Itadori, then begin preliminary negotiations with Sukuna.

If Lin Mu remembered correctly, it should be today. Once night fell, Mahito would quietly place the finger in the Yoshino home.

By then, it would attract a large number of cursed spirits!

If Lin Mu lay in wait there beforehand, he could not only gain a great deal of inheritance progress, but also save Yoshino's mother while he was at it.

As for whether Mahito would abandon the original plan after being beaten up by him, Lin Mu was not worried.

This was a meticulous plan devised by Kenjaku. He would not allow Mahito to alter it on his own.

Having made his plans, Lin Mu rose to bid Nanami farewell.

Nanami did not ask where Lin Mu was going. In his judgment, Lin Mu was already mature and strong enough; he had no right to interfere with Lin Mu's decisions.

"Be careful." Nanami merely offered a faint reminder before continuing to analyze the directions Mahito might flee.

Time passed quickly. The stifling afternoon flew by amid the pleasant conversation between Itadori and the Yoshino family.

The bullying Junpei Yoshino had suffered at school, as well as his misunderstanding of his mother, were gradually dispelled under Itadori's guidance. A bright and beautiful tomorrow was about to arrive, but in the original story, all of this was completely changed by Mahito's appearance!

The resolve he had made to protect his mother also utterly collapsed because of Mahito's arrival!

Late at night, Junpei's mother, Nagi Yoshino, woke from her sleep. Itadori had already left, and Junpei Yoshino had gone to bed early as well.

Her conversation with Itadori had made her happier than she had ever been, so she drank a few extra glasses and ended up sleeping until late at night.

"Oh no, it's gotten so late. I need to clean up quickly." Nagi Yoshino glanced at the wall clock and began preparing to clear the table.

But then, an item on the table caught her attention. It was a scarlet finger!

"Ew, that's disgusting. Did Junpei buy another collectible?" As Nagi Yoshino focused on the finger, she failed to notice a cursed spirit slowly appearing behind her, its face obscured by long hair and its body held aloft by dozens of hands!

"Ughh—, beautiful... miss, would you... sleep... with me?"

A chilling gust brushed across Nagi Yoshino's ear. In an instant, cold sweat soaked her back, and her body stiffened.

She did not know what was behind her, but she could feel that she might die very soon.

Icy hands pressed against her calves, slowly moving upward until they covered every part of her body.

Her fear of the unknown left her completely unable to entertain the thought of escaping. Even if she wanted to, her legs no longer obeyed her.

Her cries lodged in her throat, unable to come out no matter what. Junpei was in the other room; if she cried out, he might hear her and come to see what was happening.

But how could Junpei possibly deal with such a terrifying monster?

"Junpei, just keep sleeping soundly in your room. Don't come out, no matter what. Mom loves you."

Tears slid from the corners of Nagi Yoshino's eyes. The cursed spirit had already pressed itself against her back, and something strange and hard moved wantonly behind her.

Nagi Yoshino had already prepared herself to accept death. She even began seeing things—within the darkness, a pair of scarlet eyes stared fixedly at her.

Perhaps that was the legendary Grim Reaper.

Second by second, the death she expected never came. She suddenly felt a breeze pass by her, and the disgusting sensation behind her vanished at that moment.

When she finally gathered the courage to open her eyes, she saw an even more horrifying sight. The floor and walls were filled with all kinds of terrifying, twisted faces, like a realistic painting of hell.

The horrific scene dealt a massive blow to her mind. Combined with the erosion of the cursed aura, she closed her eyes and fainted.

The aura emitted by Sukuna's Finger had already attracted a large number of cursed spirits.

Lin Mu caught the falling Nagi Yoshino and carried her to the sofa. The pressure radiating from his Mangekyo Sharingan left the surrounding cursed spirits too afraid to approach for the moment.

After settling Nagi Yoshino down, Lin Mu gathered the chakra within his body into his feet, and the sound of his footsteps vanished as they touched the ground.

"Clone Technique."

Lin Mu formed hand seals with both hands, and four identical clones appeared amid a cloud of smoke.

In such a cramped residential area, powerful ninjutsu naturally could not be used. Taijutsu was the best choice for exorcising these cursed spirits.

These cursed spirits were not of a high grade either. Clones possessing twenty percent of his strength were fully capable of dealing with them.

Whoosh, whoosh—

The four clones instantly turned into afterimages. With chakra attached to their feet, even at such high speed, they made barely any sound.

With chakra scalpels, they struck and cut down the cursed spirits. Those cursed spirits, averaging around Grade 3, could not even withstand a single blow.

The clones handled the low-grade cursed spirits at Grade 3 and below, while Lin Mu dealt with those the clones could not instantly kill in one strike.

With the five Lin Mus working in close coordination, the cursed spirits were exorcised the moment they appeared.

Fortunately, the Yoshino residence was relatively secluded, so the cursed spirits drawn here were not particularly powerful overall.

Otherwise, silently exorcising all of them would have been quite difficult.

The cursed spirits could no longer appear as quickly as Lin Mu killed them. By the end, there were no cursed spirits left in the house to exorcise.

With a thought from Lin Mu, the four clones rushed out in four different directions, searching for any cursed spirits that might have been missed.

The corpses of the cursed spirits in the room gradually turned into ash and scattered away. Lin Mu's inheritance progress had also increased considerably, leaving him less than a quarter away from twenty-four percent.

Looking at the finger on the table, Lin Mu did not retrieve it. He knew that someone from Jujutsu High would be specially assigned to deal with it later.

He just did not know whether Junpei would still fall into darkness now that his mother had not died.

Not long after the clones left, Lin Mu sensed something. The clones had reached the maximum distance at which he could control them—roughly one thousand meters. Beyond that range, they would only carry out the last task assigned by the original body.

Moreover, the original body could no longer accurately sense the clones' locations, only receiving a faint sensation once a clone disappeared.

At a single thought, the four clones turned into thick smoke where they stood.

After this test, Lin Mu gained a new understanding of the Clone Technique.

Unlike the Shadow Clone Technique, where each clone possessed an independent consciousness, could act on its own, and transmitted everything it saw and heard back to the original body after disappearing.

With the basic Clone Technique, Lin Mu had to continuously issue commands and micromanage them. They also could not provide any information after disappearing.

That was not much of an issue when there were only a few clones, but if his chakra increased later on and he created hundreds or thousands of clones at once, having to micromanage all of them himself would be far too troublesome.

He remembered that Madara Uchiha knew the Shadow Clone Technique, and he had also mastered the strongest clone technique, the Wood Release Clone Technique!

Its realism was so convincing that even Madara Uchiha himself had once been fooled by it. In the world of jujutsu, probably no one besides Satoru Gojo could possibly see through it.

Furthermore, every Wood Release clone was extremely powerful and could use the Sharingan and activate Susanoo.

The scene of Madara Uchiha using Wood Release clones to fight the Five Kage five against five was still vivid in his memory.

He would obtain ninjutsu sooner or later; he just did not yet know how it would be acquired.

Would he directly gain new ninjutsu, or would they be upgraded based on the Clone Technique?

Lin Mu shook his head. There was no point considering that now. Once his inheritance progress was high enough, he would naturally find out. What mattered was raising his inheritance progress as quickly as possible!

Although Lin Mu appeared far stronger than the main cast now, he knew that he was still far behind Satoru Gojo and Sukuna at his peak.

There was even an enormous hidden bomb: the super cursed spirit that Brain intended to create by assimilating Tengen!

In the original story, Brain was hastily written out, and that plan was abandoned halfway through.

But because of Lin Mu's appearance this time, many things might change. The further things progressed, the greater the impact on the plot would become.

Lin Mu had no choice but to prepare in advance for the super cursed spirit!

After confirming that all the cursed spirits nearby had been cleared out, Lin Mu secretly left one clone behind and departed from the Yoshino residence.